Methodology for practical operation of short video

As usual, I have summarized some practical experiences and success cases and compiled them here for everyone to discuss and learn. Today I’m going to share a set of practical methodologies for short videos, which I find quite useful.

1. A set of methodologies for short video practice

The first point is to learn how to collect data. There is no such thing as coincidence for many popular works. Behind all popular videos there is data logic to support them. When your data collection and analysis are accurate enough, you will be able to understand their patterns.

There is a method that I think is a bit stupid, but it is particularly useful: no matter which platform you want to use, whether it is Douyin, Kuaishou, or Xiaohongshu, you can find the top 100 peer accounts on this platform that have similar account attributes, positioning, and personality to yours. Then analyze them one by one to find their hot products. It would be better to have a table listing these 100 accounts, and then look through the top 10 best data of each account, you will be able to find the outstanding features of these accounts. After watching, you should make a record, that is, record what you saw.

The rules are fixed in writing.

Let me teach you a trick. We can list out every time point, duration, shot, technique, and picture in the video, and then analyze second by second what is done well, where the transition is, how the rhythm is controlled, and how the segments are connected. In this way, a very abstract video can be visualized and modeled, which is convenient for research and disassembly and copying.

After looking at the data, keep taking pictures. In fact, it is all about internet sense. When you are creating many video accounts, it is useless to just learn theory, you have to put it into practice. Many people say, when do we truly learn something? When you teach others. To teach others, you must first do it yourself. “Learning, doing and teaching” means that for any matter, you should first learn it, then do it yourself, and finally teach others to be truly “capable”. There is still a big difference between seeing and actually doing it, and it requires repeated consideration and constant review.

Finally, pay attention to forming rules. This will make it easier to integrate and turn it into your own content. After learning and practice, these data are modeled, and then patterns are found through the models. Finally, based on the patterns and combined with one's own situation, they are turned into one's own innovation.

2. When operating, you should avoid treating the symptoms instead of the root cause.

When doing operations, never treat the symptoms without addressing the root cause.

Today, the team discussed this issue when doing traffic design copy for a client.

The team leader complained that the poor traffic generation in the previous few times was due to copywriting problems, and that he probably just needed a good editor. He asked me to transfer a senior editor from other departments to write the article. I got furious when I heard that. Why?

If editors are useful, what are the roles of publishers and operators? Finding an editor is a lazy way of thinking during the operation process. An editor is just good at writing copy, which does not mean that he understands the logic of attracting traffic. The poor traffic-attracting effect of the article lies in the unclear structure design and positioning of the article, and the unattractive bait. Is it useful to find an editor?

It’s useless to find the best editor. Editing is just the last step in copy packaging. You positioned the core logic wrong, but you put the blame on the editor?

The editor is merely the scapegoat for poor conversions. When we look at problems and conduct operations, we must deeply analyze the main contradictions rather than just looking at the surface.

The correct approach to this matter should be to look for similar products and search the entire network for similar products and put soft articles in the information flow on Baidu and Toutiao, which have been verified by others.

We collect them and analyze the structural articles one by one to see what the structure is and what role each structure plays, and then turn it into our own structure. After confirmation, we find an editor to process it according to the structure and requirements to form our own traffic-generating copy. Don't use tactical diligence to cover up strategic laziness.

3. How to increase team operation efficiency tenfold

I held a work meeting with the team today and found that almost everyone lacked operational thinking. This form of work would appear messy, directionless, and inefficient. Therefore, I sorted out the following three working methods, hoping that the team can be improved:

1. Use the [user perspective] to work backwards to form a marketing or operation path, and use the decomposition method to continuously optimize the factors of each touchpoint and the conversion rate between touchpoints.

(Attachment 📎: Design your own user perspective path breakdown diagram)

2. Use [data thinking] to analyze and filter out a few fixed data for each marketing and operation action, the most common ones are Roi, Ltv, Arpu, and then continuously analyze and compare, do more AB testing, and eventually continuously approach or even exceed the preset target value.

(Attachment: Design your own operational review chart, including data indicators that directly affect the results, and set expected values)

3. Use [model thinking] to fix. After a stable path is formed, the path needs to be temporarily solidified, and standards for each link need to be designed to form a complete set of standard templates and SOPs, so that even new operators can follow suit.

(Attachment: Design your own templates and model tables, whether basic configuration or daily content, to form standard templates and models, solidify operational results, and need to be refined to font standards, color standards, size standards, visual standards, etc.)

Only by completing the above three points, making good division of responsibilities, and clarifying job objectives and workload can we have the foundation to do a good job in marketing and operations.

4. You can earn 5 million yuan a year by raising cats

Today I saw a project on Shengcai about making four to five million a year by raising cats. I think it's interesting, so I'd like to share it.

Let me first talk about this industry, which is both common and mysterious. It is common that the number of cat owners has been growing, and various catteries and cat cafes can be seen everywhere in first-tier cities. Why is it said to be mysterious? Because after you really understand this industry chain, you will find that their operation segmentation is astonishing. I also found it particularly interesting after seeing others share it. Let’s first take a look at several monetization models in this market segment:

The first one is to make money by taking advantage of information asymmetry. As the name suggests, it is what everyone understands as "middlemen making a profit from the price difference". There is an army of cat dealers lurking around us. They don't need to raise cats themselves, their core competitive advantage is their "cat source". The more cats they have, the more choices they can provide to customers, and it is easier to negotiate prices.

This type of cat traffickers generally collect cat sources through some mainstream media platforms, such as Xianyu, 58, QQ groups, Weibo, Douyin, WeChat groups, etc. The cat source information mainly includes some information and photos of kittens, which are packaged and priced higher and sold through their own online and offline channels. Most of the cat selling information we see on WeChat is from cat traffickers, and very few are real cats.

This type of people makes a fortune by taking advantage of this information gap. This model is asset-light, requires little investment, does not require self-maintenance, and one can quickly get started and make money with just a mobile phone, and there is no threshold. There is no need to worry about after-sales damage, just sell it. To put it bluntly, it is making money by taking advantage of information asymmetry.

The second type mainly makes money by selling cat products. Such as cat food, cat litter, and various cat-related supplies. There are also two money-making models here, one is the production side and the other is the agency side.

1) Let’s talk about the production side first. In addition to large factories, many small businesses and individuals will make some cat consumables, such as cat food, canned food, attractive cat toys, etc., and edit them into copywriting information and sell them on WeChat Moments, Xianyu, and Taobao.

The manufacturer needs to occupy funds for product research and development, production, management, channel development, etc., which has high thresholds. If you do it on a small scale, you can evaluate the ROI and make a hit. If the product is unique, you can even charge a premium and the market will still be good.

2) Now let’s talk about the agent. That is to say, they are sold through their own channels, and many of them are sold through the tob method. Especially if you are lucky enough to find a hot product and produce and sell it quickly, then you have caught the right wave of popularity.

The third way is to make money in physical stores. Such as cat cafes, pet shops, and pet grooming centers. A cat cafe is a coffee shop with cats as its theme. People go in to pet cats under the pretext of drinking coffee. Whether a cat cafe can make money depends on its location, because the location determines the traffic, rent, and labor costs.

The fourth type is to make money by breeding cats. The key to this type of model is to look at the breed of cat. You sell cats of different grades to people with different purchasing power. If you choose a good and popular cat breed, it is very likely that you will become rich overnight. I heard someone share a case in which a litter of five kittens was sold for 300,000 yuan.

Today I am sharing this project just to share ideas. A cat can dig into so many money-making models, so what about other categories?

I hope you can learn from this, but I still have to say that every industry has its trends and risks. As long as you are willing to dig deeper, many opportunities are actually lying around you.

Author: Zhen Miao

Source: Zhen Miao